Conventionally, artificial knee joint placement technique has been carried out, with which a knee joint being functionally deteriorated is replaced with an artificial one. The artificial knee joint includes a femoral component to be placed on a femur and a tibial component to be placed on a tibia. Before these components are respectively placed on the bones, tools referred to as trials for fitting, whose shapes are respectively substantially the same as their corresponding components, are usually placed on the bones, and a trial reposition is carried out.
Here, in an artificial knee joint of the type having a post (projection) on a tibial component, such as PS (posterior stabilized) type one, it is necessary to cut an intercondylar area between a medial condyle and a lateral condyle on a distal end of the femur when a trial of the femoral component is placed on the femur. The cutting of the intercondylar area is usually carried out using a tool referred to as an intercondylar cutting guide in the following steps (i) to (iv) (see, for example, Patent document 1):
(i) attaching the intercondylar cutting guide to the distal end of the femur;
(ii) cutting the intercondylar area via the intercondylar cutting guide by using a bone cutting tool;
(iii) removing the intercondylar cutting guide from the distal end of the femur; and
(iv) placing the trial on the distal end of the femur after being subjected to the intercondylar cutting.
The conventional intercondylar cutting guide as described in Patent document 1 is made up of the trial and another tool. Therefore the above steps (i) to (iv) are necessary for the placement of the trial, thus leading to the problem that surgical time becomes longer. There is also the problem that the number of tools constituting a tool system is increased.
Patent document 2 describes a structure that secures an intercondylar cutting guide to a trial.
Even with the structure, it takes longer to secure the intercondylar cutting guide to the trial, thus leading to the problem that surgical time becomes longer. Similarly to Patent document 1 as described above, there is also the problem that the number of tools is increased.